Tag Archives: case

FTC Sues Intel, Intel Says “Misguided”

Posted on December 16, 2009 by admin

The Federal Trade Commission has sued Intel, saying it has "abused its market dominance" according to the LA Times . Richard A. Feinstein, director of the FTC's Bureau of Competition is quoted as saying: "Intel has engaged in a deliberate campaign to hamstring competitive threats to its monopoly. It's been running roughshod over the principles of fair play and the laws protecting competition on the merits." Intel issued the following statement today: "Intel has competed fairly and lawfully. Its actions have benefited consumers. The highly competitive microprocessor industry, of which Intel is a key part, has kept innovation robust and prices declining at a faster rate than any other industry. The FTC's case is misguided. It is based largely on claims that the FTC added at the last minute and has not investigated. In addition, it is explicitly not based on existing law but is instead intended to make new rules for regulating business conduct. These new rules would harm consumers by reducing innovation and raising prices." Intel senior vice president and general counsel Doug Melamed added, "This case could have, and should have, been settled. Settlement talks had progressed very far but stalled when the FTC insisted on unprecedented remedies – including the restrictions on lawful price competition and enforcement of intellectual property rights set forth in the complaint -- that would make it impossible for Intel to conduct business." "The FTC's rush to file this case will cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars to litigate issues that the FTC has not fully investigated. It is the normal practice of antitrust enforcement agencies to investigate the facts before filing suit. The Commission did not do that in this case," said Melamed. The FTC's suit claims Intel engaged in threatening and rewarding of big-name PC makers like Dell, HP, and IBM. Last month, Intel agreed to pay $1.25 billion to settle multiple disputes with rival chip manufacturer AMD over similar accusations. Intel was also recently hit with an antitrust suit from the New York Attorney General. Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Legal, Pay-Per-Click | Tagged antitrust-suit, case, doug melamed, government, intel, monopoly, price competition, senior vice president | Leave a comment

Perfect 10 Comes Out Swinging at Google Again

Posted on December 2, 2009 by cgseo

Those who have been following the search industry for some time, may recall that Google had some legal issues with the (former) magazine Perfect 10 (nsfw). The company, which ceased publication of its magazine, but still operates on the web, has issued a press release saying that its five year battle with the search giant is "about to heat up." This week, Perfect 10 completed its filing of a motion for sanctions against Google in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. Perfect 10 is accusing Google of "widespread discovery abuse," which the company says includes multiple violations of three separate court orders. Perfect 10's legal feud with Google began back in 2004. The case dealt with Google's use of thumbnails from Perfect 10's site. It was essentially a question of whether or not that was considered fair use. Google had eventually lost the case, but the ruling against Google had been tossed out by an appeals panel . That was in 2007. However, it did not end there. Fast forward to now. "Google appears to have the view that it is above the law," says Perfect 10 President, Dr. Norm Zada. "We spent a great deal of time and effort obtaining Court orders requiring Google to produce documents critical to our case. In our view, Google has not complied with those orders." Perfect 10 says the case revolves around the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which was passed by Congress in 1998 to address issues concerning copyright infringement on the Internet. "Under the DMCA, a search engine such as Google may receive limited immunity from monetary damages for copyright infringement if it complies with the requirements of the DMCA," Zada says. "The search engine must act expeditiously to remove or disable access to infringing material upon receiving notice of infringement from the copyright owner, and it must adopt a procedure so that copyright holders will not have to provide the search engine with notices about the same infringing material or the same infringers over and over." Perfect 10 says it has argued that Google has "failed to satisfy" these things. Perfect 10 says a judge ordered Google to produce its DMCA log, which the company says is defined as "a spreadsheet-type document summarizing DMCA notices received, the identity of the notifying party and the accused infringer, and the actions (if any) taken in response." Perfect 10 is insisting in its press release that Google has violated multiple court orders, and that Perfect 10 can't "fairly litigate the case" without such documents. Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Legal, Pay-Per-Click | Tagged amp, case, congress, digital, fairly-litigate, immunity, internet, law, Legal, motion for sanctions, perfect, search, search industry, search-engine, time | Leave a comment